1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image forming apparatus, particularly, to an apparatus in which a plurality of sheet feeding cassettes having a sheet storing portion and a sheet feeding portion configured to feed a sheet stored in the sheet storing portion is vertically disposed.
2. Description of the Related Art
In image forming apparatuses such as a facsimile apparatus, a copying machine, and a printer, a sheet feeding cassette configured to store sheets to be supplied to an image forming portion is mounted on an image forming apparatus main body in a pullable manner. Moreover, in the image forming apparatus, the sheet feeding cassette is pulled out to supply the sheet, and the sheets stored in the sheet feeding cassette are sequentially conveyed to the image forming portion by a sheet feeding unit to perform the image formation onto the sheet at the time of image formation. Furthermore, recently, there has been an increasing demand for formation of an image on a large quantity and various kinds of sheets, and a plurality of sheet feeding cassettes has been vertically disposed in the image forming apparatus main body according to the demand, which makes it possible to cope with storing of a large quantity of sheets and accommodation of various kinds of sheets.
Herein, in the image forming apparatus that includes the sheet feeding cassette, even when the image forming apparatus main body are installed to make the back surface or side surface thereof close to a wall, it is requested to perform the sheet supply, the removal of jammed sheet, and the maintenance of components in the apparatus only from an operation side (front side) of the apparatus. This is to allow the image forming apparatus to be installed and used even in a place of a narrow space.
Thus, in the image forming apparatus of the related art, an apparatus having sheet feeding cassettes vertically provided at a plurality of positions has been suggested. The sheet feeding cassettes have a sheet feeding portion, a sheet conveying route configured to allow the sheet that is fed by the sheet feeding portion to pass therethrough, and an opening and closing door configured to open the sheet conveying route that are provided on a front side of the apparatus (see Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 10-157225). Moreover, when the sheet is jammed in the sheet conveying route, by opening the opening and closing door to open the sheet conveying route, the jammed sheet can be removed without damage. With such a configuration, it is possible to perform the sheet supply and the removal of the jammed sheet in the sheet conveying route only from the operation side (front side) of the image forming apparatus.
However, in the image forming apparatus vertically provided with a plurality of sheet feeding cassettes of this configuration, for example, when the sheet is fed from the sheet feeding cassette of a lower stage, it is not possible to perform the supply of the sheet to the sheet feeding cassette of an upper stage. Thus, for example, if the sheet feeding portion is provided on the back side of the image forming apparatus, it is possible to supply the sheet to the sheet feeding cassette that is not used for supply of the sheet during an image forming operation. However, when the sheet feeding portion is provided on the back side of the image forming apparatus, there is a need to perform the removal of the jammed sheet from the back side of the image forming apparatus main body with respect to the sheet feeding portion and the sheet conveying route.
Thus, the invention was made in view of such circumstances, and it is desirable to provide an image forming apparatus capable of improving the supply of a sheet to a sheet feeding cassette and jam recovery performances.